


If You Ever Come Back

by Asynchronous



Category: Sanders Sides
Genre: Breakup, Human AU, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-16
Updated: 2017-09-16
Packaged: 2018-12-30 08:09:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 995
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12104421
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Asynchronous/pseuds/Asynchronous
Summary: Doing everything perfectly won't guarantee that everything will be perfect. (But Logan is certainly going to try, because what else can he do?)





	If You Ever Come Back

**Author's Note:**

> I do not recommend listening to breakup songs by The Script too often, friends. Don't recommend it. It will make you sad.
> 
> I don't really like angst, reading or writing it, but I thought I'd try something outside my comfort zone for once.

Virgil never thought he would be filled with dread at the sight of a clean house, but this… this was beyond troublesome.

He cleared his throat. “Logan?”

Virgil’s heart sank when Logan’s head jerk towards him. That little flicker of hope that illuminated his entire being for the smallest of moments. The way it all melted out of him when he saw that it was Virgil in the doorway.

“Yes, Virgil?” Logan said stiffly.

Virgil almost lost his nerve, but he had lost his nerve far too many times in the past week, and it was time to be there for his friend. Even if his friend didn’t want him to be there.

“They’re doing poetry readings at the library tonight,” Virgil said slowly, carefully. “Would you like to come with me?”

“No thank you, Virgil,” Logan said too-politely. “I need to stay here tonight.”

Virgil sighed and made his way to the couch. Two weeks ago, he would have had to clear a few books and probably a cardigan from the cushion before he could take a seat, but now, the seat was already clear. “Why do you need to stay here?” Virgil asked carefully.

Logan looked at Virgil incredulously. “For when Patton gets back,” he said simply, as if it was the most obvious statement he’d ever been forced to utter.

Virgil stayed silent for a moment, considering how to proceed. This conversation had failed several times this week, and he wasn’t sure if either of them could handle it failing again. “…it’s been two weeks, Logan.”

Logan looked around desperately for something, anything, to distract him from the point Virgil was trying to make. His eyes finally landed on a box in the kitchen. “Ah, yes. You’re right. The doughnuts are probably terribly stale by now. I should probably go to the store and get some more. Well, let’s do that now, hopefully I’ll get back before Patton does…” Logan stood to grab his car keys. Virgil grabbed his wrist.

“You don’t need more doughnuts,” Virgil said firmly.

Logan stammered in exasperation. “O-of course I don’t. They’re not for me, Virgil, they’re for Patton. Honestly, I don’t understand what you want from me. You want me to leave the house. You don’t want me to leave the house. What’s your deal?”

“My _deal_ is-“ Virgil began, but stopped when Logan flinched. Virgil breathed in slowly and carefully. _Calm down, Verge_. _This isn’t about you. Be patient._ “Can you please just sit down? I don’t want to go anywhere just yet.”

Logan looked displeased, but complied. “Then what do you want?” he spat, glaring at the bookshelf across from them.

Virgil squinted at the bookshelf. Alphabetical order by title. It had been in alphabetical order by author’s last name yesterday. Virgil thought he was imagining it at first, but since he started paying attention four days ago, he became certain that Logan was reorganizing the bookshelf every day.

“I want you to stop avoiding my eyes. Please look at me,” Virgil said quietly.

Logan’s head turned to Virgil, slowly and painfully, as if every muscle in his neck and face were rusted, and Virgil’s stomach twisted at the look on Logan’s face. His eyes pleaded with Virgil to let him look away again, his eyes shaking to find any distraction at all from what he knew Virgil would say. And Virgil almost let the conversation drop when he saw how tired Logan looked, but it wouldn’t get better by allowing him to continue this way. So he found his courage and prayed this was the right thing to do.

“Patton left, Logan. He moved back to Florida. He isn’t coming back.”

Silence. Virgil was tempted to reach out and poke Logan, just to see if he had frozen solid, but that would be inappropriate in context, so he merely sat and waited out the stifling silence.

Logan’s breath hitched, and Virgil had never been so grateful for uneven breathing: at least it was proof that he was breathing at all. Virgil offered his arms, and Logan started to lean in to accept the gesture…

“I… I have to… I have to…” Logan pushed out of Virgil’s arms and tried to stand again. “I have to do something, surely there’s something I have to do, I…”

 “Please sit down, Logan,” said Virgil.

“No, I need to… Damn it, I can’t remember, but there’s something I need to be doing!” His chest was heaving, his hands twisted in his hair, his lip trembling.

“Logan!”

Logan jumped. “There… there has to be…” he sat back down shakily. “There has to be something I can do.”

Not a single item out of place. Every surface dusted and polished. No signs of disarray. No signs of life.

“What do you mean?” Virgil asked.

Logan leaned into the back of the couch and closed his eyes. “He can’t just… Be gone. There has to… There has to be something I can do.”

Ah. There it was.

“Not this time.” The words tasted bitter in Virgil’s mouth, but someone had to say them. “Not this time.”

 “Not this time,” Logan whispered back. A single tear fell. And then another. And then he was leaning into Virgil’s shoulder, sobbing two weeks’ worth of tears. “He left, he left, he left,” he repeated miserably.

“Shh, you’re okay,” Virgil soothed, rubbing his best friend’s back. The words were empty; he knew Logan wasn’t okay, and Logan knew it too, but it was something to say when neither of them knew what else could be said.

He’d be okay eventually, though, and so would Patton. They would each live their own lives, live in separate houses, find different partners, find the happiness they hadn’t managed to find in each other. Just not tonight. Tonight, Logan would finally let the pain seep out from the steel cage he built for it, and finally start to accept that there were some things out of his control.

**Author's Note:**

> ...yeah. Angst is definitely outside my comfort zone. Alas. Hope I made your day at least a little worse. That's what angst is for, right?


End file.
